Fire investigators are sorting through the ashes of four mysterious arsons last night in Southeast Portland, where four apparently random cars were torched between 2:30 and 4:30 AM. The Oregonian has the details:
The first, at 2:30 a.m., left a 2004 Ford van burning outside NW Saw & Tool at the corner of Southeast Yamhill Street and Dr. Martin Luther King Boulevard, and caused $8,325 in damage. The next, reported at 4:07 a.m., happened near Southeast 37th Avenue & Harrison Street. A 1997 Honda Civic was burned, causing a $5,000 loss. The third fire, reported at 4:10 a.m. at Southeast 45th Avenue and Ivon Street, caused $2,500 in damage to a 1995 Toyota Tercel. The fourth fire occurred at 4:22 a.m. near Southeast 52nd Avenue and Clinton street, left a 1985 Toyota pickup with $1,000 in damages.
The car at SE 45th and Ivon was parked in front of Shannon Greenfield’s house. It was her neighbor’s Tercel that got torched, and her view of the scene doesn’t help answer who did this and why:
I was sleeping away and I heard a doorbell and knock at the door. I stumbled out of bed and a woman at door said, “Is that your car out front? It’s on fire!” A firetruck pulled up and there were smoke and flames billowing out of the car. I don’t know how they would have picked this car, there were four parked out there right next to each other and it’s just a crappy red car from the eighties.
- Shannon Greenfield
Anarchists? Car-hating cyclists? Unruly youths? Tipsters should call call the Arson Hotline at 503-823-3791 or, of course, leave your input and speculation in the comments.
It was Matt Davis getting ready for NOLA.
My speculation is that these vehicles had their doors unlocked, so the arsonists didn’t have to make any noise getting into the vehicle to start the fire. This way, they could be a fair distance away before the fire got so large that people would wake up and come outside.
As always, my money is on no-good youths that are probably male.
However, we can’t ignore anarchists, since they’ve proved so effective at producing incoherent bodies of evidence only tangentially related to their post-hoc stated goals/methods.
“Bottle-nose bruises. Blow-hole burns. This is clearly the work of rowdy teens.”
Hmmm, arsonist IS eerily similar to the word anarchist, just sayin’.
[Confidential to the arsonist] Hey Trashy…whydja burn old lady Seple’s pension check? Still wetting the bed?
I live in that neighborhood and on top of this, there also seems to be a problem with graffiti. The Rite-Aid on 39th and Division had the word “vegan” and later “police state” spray-painted on their wall. Then the Space room had “vegan” spray-painted on their building.
Why can’t we have cool graffiti like they do in NoPo?